Today I made a car commercial

By Todd Stadler · Friday, March 31, 2006 11:27am

So Chevrolet* decided it would be a good idea to let people make their own commercials for their truck, the Tahoe*.

They give you a series of clips of the truck driving this way and that, powering up sand dunes and mountains, perched on impossibly tall peaks (is it really manly if you have to get there by helicopter?), seats folding (man, there are a lot of clips of seats folding!), and various other bits of car porn. You can overlay text on these clips or on one of three colored screens.

And, of course, you're allowed to pick one instrumental soundtrack from among the following: "I M Hip N Urban" by Not Britney Spears, "Loco Mexicano" by Not Herb Alpert (for those light 'n' zany spots), "Rokkin' My Testosterone" by Not Linkin Park, "Rokkin' My Testosterone (Mixed Demographic Funk Mix)" by Not Linkin Park, "Maudlin, Yet Wealthy" by Not Portishead, and several lame songs whose genre can only be defined as "only found in car commercials you didn't pay attention to anyway". For those of you visiting the commercial-making site, those would be tracks 01, 04, 05, 07, and 06, respectively.

The first thing that occurred to me upon seeing this collection of truck clips, tunes, and text was, "Hey, I bet this is the same tool that they use to make the real truck commercials on TV!"

I mean, really, have you seen an interesting truck commercial lately? (Full disclosure: I haven't had a TV in my house for over half a year, so maybe the ads have gotten really interesting lately — maybe.) It's always just a bunch of clips of trucks doing manly things, with a few video "bones" thrown to non-manly people by way of showing the truck holding lots of people or not running over old ladies or something. Plus, of course, a demographic-appropriate musical soundtrack.

The second thing that occurred to me upon seeing this commercial-making toolkit — and this occurred to every other blogger on the planet as well, whether or not they admit or remember it — was, "How can I use this for my own entertainment, to make the funny, and possibly to mock Chevrolet* in the process?"

I mean, it wouldn't be the internet if that didn't happen.

As such, I present to you below the commercials I made. I have no idea how long my particular movies will remain saved on their servers, given that they're not serious entries in Chevrolet's* commercial-making contest. So I'll show stills from my ads below — you can get the idea from them — but you really should follow the links to see the ads while you can. Because, really, it's all about the bumpin' soundtrack.

Ad #1: "Obligatory SUV Joke"

View "Obligatory SUV Joke" on ChevyApprentice.com.

Oh, like you didn't see that one coming. What's odd is I have the sneaking suspicion that a real truck commercial has already played off these Sound of Music lyrics, ironically juxtaposing something so girly-girl with something so imposingly manly. Oh, the manliness!

Ad #2: "Head Like a Tahoe"

View "Head Like a Tahoe" on ChevyApprentice.com.

I'm not a Nine Inch Nails fanatic or anything, and I certainly don't agree with the lyrics of "Head Like a Hole" as a prescription for good attitude, but I think the nihilistic words do make for an interesting juxtaposition with car commercial schlock. What I particularly like is how the lyrics seem entirely wrong for the setting, and yet, the more you think about it, the more aptly they describe the truck-buying subtext of many commercials. I also like how there were lots of clips of seats "bowing down" to choose from.

Ad #3: "Rock My Interior"

View "Rock My Interior" on ChevyApprentice.com.

This one was probably my favorite. It's the un-commercial. Not once do you see the car's exterior. Just seats, seats, seats! And yet, the soundtrack tells you that these are the most gutsy, mountain-climbing, "I will tear this bicycle to pieces using my bare hands and then eat it all!!" seats you will ever be priveleged to experience. Lots of 'em. Oh, and you get a radio, too.

*Fine, yes, I'm shilling for Chevrolet. Oh, I did my best to make commercials that didn't put Chevrolet in a good light, that wouldn't sell the car, but in this day of irony, double-irony, and double-dog-irony with a cherry on top, there's no denying that I'm still doing Chevrolet's bidding by talking about them and linking to their site and creating interest in their products. No such thing as bad publicity and all that. And as insidious as marketers are these days, I'd even believe that the folks behind the make-a-commercial Web site imagined that people like me would do this. I mean, think about it — who gets excited about making a car commercial like the ones on TV? Ah, but who gets excited about "subverting the system" to make ads to send to their friends who normally hate car commercials? Cynical? Paranoid? Probably. But such are the thoughts one has when having too much fun wasting too much time on a corporate Web site, and then telling his friends all about said site. It's the guilt talking. Also, yes, I'm committed to calling them Chevrolet, and not this Chevy nonsense. I'm well aware that they'd rather not have you red-white-and-blue-blooded Americans think of them as having a fancy French name. Ooh, I'm so cantankerous!